GEOG*3020 Global Environmental Change

Assessment

The grade determination for this course is indicated in the following table. A brief description of each assessment is provided below. Select Content on the navbar to locate Assessments in the table of contents panel to review further details of each assessment. Due dates can be found under the Schedule heading of this outline.

Table 1: Course Assessment

Assessment Descriptions

Evidence-Based Blog Posts & Responses to Blog Posts

This is your opportunity to practice and demonstrate effective writing skills while participating in informed dialogue about the most pressing issues of our day. Perhaps more importantly, this is your opportunity to be assessed on, and to improve, your ability to grapple with core conceptual issues in the field of global environmental change, and to articulate complex thoughts in a succinct, intelligible manner. The response that you will write is designed to encourage peer-to-peer knowledge exchange about the theories, concepts and research covered in the course. All of the blog posts that you will be asked to write will provide you with an opportunity to grapple with fundamental debates in the field of global environmental change. Sharpening your ideas and arguments around these debates will prepare you to make informed and meaningful contributions to the conversations around environmental and resource management in a global context. These debates include value-based judgements (political differences) as well as fact-based judgements (scientific deficiencies).

Group Project: Strategic Planning for Global Environmental Change

The purpose of this assignment is to improve written communication skills through the combination of scientific knowledge synthesis and graphical illustration, as well as skills in collaboration and cooperation. This assignment will also develop skills in, and exposure to, interdisciplinary research. Students must necessarily touch on concepts from political economy, planning, engineering, climate science, and other disciplines in order to put this report together. In addition, students will learn how to develop and deploy tools in effective communication, namely mental maps / cause-effect diagraming and writing an executive summary.

Final Exam

This course requires you to write a traditional sit-down final exam. Final exams are written on campus at the University of Guelph or at alternate locations for students at a distance. The final exam for this course is cumulative, meaning that you are responsible for all course material. You will be presented with a number of different question types, including multiple-choice questions, as well as short and/or long answer questions. When preparing for the exam, it is important for you to be aware that long answer questions are application-based. They will require you to combine what you’ve learned from course content with what you’ve learned from the required course readings.

The exam will be scheduled to take place during the exam period at the end of the term. It is assumed that all DE students will be writing their final examination on campus at the University of Guelph. University of Guelph degree and associate diploma students must check WebAdvisor for their examination schedule. Open Learning program students must check the  Open Learning Program Final Examination Schedule for their examination schedule.

If you are studying at a distance, you can request to write your final exam at an alternate location. It is recommended that you make arrangements as early as possible in the semester since changes cannot be guaranteed after the deadline. Exam schedules for off-campus exams will be emailed by Week 9 of the course. For more information, please visit  Final Exams.

https://webadvisor.uoguelph.ca

http://opened.uoguelph.ca/student-resources/Open-Learning-Program-Final-Exam- Schedule

http://opened.uoguelph.ca/student-resources/final-exams